Dean's Letter
Dear ML Readers, AS I WRITE THIS, WE HAVE JUST RETURNED TO MORE COMMUNAL INTERACTIONS POST-PANDEMIC. I don’t like the phrase “new normal” because it implies a desire to return to the past, which is not only impossible, but also assumes traditions and norms of the past are better than innovations of the future. After more than a year of reflection, I am instead excited by the post-pandemic possibilities of redefining old cultural narratives and embracing educational creativity. I recently had the exciting opportunity to travel across the State of Tennessee and visit with some of our alumni in person for the first time in over a year. This trip showed me several things: Memphis Law alums continue to find success across a wide array of fields and industries, from brewery owners to general counsel at some of the South’s biggest firms and everywhere in between. No matter what city I found myself in, I was heartened by the positive encouragement and enthusiasm by the ranks of the Memphis Law community for all that the law school is working towards. And finally, it was clear to me that the desire to learn more, do more and be more a part of what we’re doing at Memphis Law (now in person!) is something shared by our alums, no matter the location. This same trip reminded me of the importance of building community, a theme that I intend to build upon in the coming year, while integrating the three driving pillars of my deanship: promotion of student success, fostering a culture of diversity and inclusion and embracing teaching excellence and innovation. Memphis Law would not be the amazing law school it is today without the various communities we are a part of and as we return to more in-person activities, I am excited to work with our students, alumni, legal 2
UNIVERSIT Y OF MEMPHIS
communities and others to ensure we continue to build meaningful relationships and communities in order to achieve the goals I’ve set for our law school. One of the things I’ve looked forward to most about this semester has been the ability to spend more time together in person moving forward. The University of Memphis, including the Law School, returned to holding inperson classes this fall semester with all faculty, staff, and students returning to the building and resuming (to the best of our abilities) our routines from more than a year ago. I’m not sure any of us fully appreciate what that means quite yet or just how much we were affected by a year of social distancing, isolation, remote learning and working, and an overall sense of worry in many regards. Our classrooms have been mostly empty, but our lives never stopped. How we continue to deal with coming back and gathering together again in our law school community will be hard, but it’s a problem I am happy to have to (finally) deal with. In a certain sense, the coronavirus made the unrealistic possible. Classes once thought impossible to teach remotely have now proven to be effective via that model. Courts and government agencies that adhered to traditional ways of doing things now recognize that innovative and creative methods are possible. Faculty and staff members adapted their workload and styles highlighting flexibility and
creativity across a variety of projects. Students and attorneys involved with our clinic and externship programs found amazing ways to still educate, advocate, and persevere, with many discovering that remote working opened new doors for them that they never considered before. In short, it wasn’t all bad. At the very least, we learned many valuable lessons from how we navigated the entire ordeal. And many things once thought unrealistic turned out to be advantageous. As we move forward, we will endeavor to adopt the successful practices we discovered to enhance our ability to educate the next generation of attorneys. As we embark upon our initial stage of postpandemic life, I am happy to note that one large item on our wish list did finally come to fruition, and was a strong signal of our return to normalcy. In May, we held our first in-person commencement ceremony in almost two years at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium
